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Tag: Tim Cook

  • Apple boss Tim Cook to have pay cut by over 40% this year

    Apple boss Tim Cook to have pay cut by over 40% this year

    Apple chief executive Tim Cook will see his annual pay package slashed by more than 40% this year.

    The technology giant says Mr Cook requested the cut after criticism from shareholders.

    Apple’s compensation committee awarded him a total “target compensation” of $49m (£45.1m) for 2023.

    Last year the iPhone maker’s shares fell sharply in the face of supply chain issues and a global economic slowdown.

    “The Compensation Committee balanced shareholder feedback, Apple’s exceptional performance, and a recommendation from Mr Cook to adjust his compensation in light of the feedback received,” Apple said in a filing with a US financial watchdog.

    The move will see Mr Cook’s annual basic salary unchanged at $3m, as well as a bonus of up to $6m.

    The biggest difference to his pay package is how he will be awarded shares in the firm.

    In 2022 the company granted him $75m of shares, half of which were based on how well Apple performed on the stock market.

    For this year his stock award target has been cut to $40m, with three quarters of that dependant on share performance.

    The target for Mr Cook’s compensation for 2022 was $84m, although his actual total pay for last year was $99.4m. That figure included $630,600 in personal security costs and $712,500 for his use of a private jet.

    Last year Apple shareholders were urged by a leading investor advisory group to vote against Mr Cook’s pay package.

    In a letter to investors, Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) said there are “significant concerns” over the “design and magnitude” of the package.

    The ISS said Mr Cook’s pay was 1,447 times more than the wage of an average Apple employee.

    Mr Cook became Apple’s chief executive in August 2011, just weeks before the death of co-founder Steve Jobs.

    Under Mr Cook’s leadership Apple became the first company to reach a stock market valuation of $3tn before falling to about $2.1tn during a tumultuous year for the technology industry.

    Covid lockdowns at factories in China, supply chain delays and a global economic slowdown have helped push down Apple’s share price by more than 20% over the last year.

    The 62-year-old’s personal wealth stands at around $1.7bn, according to Forbes magazine. Mr Cook has pledged to give away his entire fortune during his lifetime.

  • CEO of Apple, Tim Cook to receive pay cut by over 40% this year

    CEO of Apple, Tim Cook to receive pay cut by over 40% this year

    Tim Cook, the CEO of Apple, will receive a more than 40% compensation reduction this year.

    The technology giant says Mr Cook requested the cut after criticism from shareholders.

    Apple’s compensation committee awarded him a total “target compensation” of $49m (£45.1m) for 2023.

    Last year the iPhone maker’s shares fell sharply in the face of supply chain issues and a global economic slowdown.

    “The Compensation Committee balanced shareholder feedback, Apple’s exceptional performance, and a recommendation from Mr Cook to adjust his compensation in light of the feedback received,” Apple said in a filing with a US financial watchdog.

    The move will see Mr Cook’s annual basic salary unchanged at $3m, as well as a bonus of up to $6m.

    The biggest difference to his pay package is how he will be awarded shares in the firm.

    In 2022 the company granted him $75m of shares, half of which were based on how well Apple performed on the stock market.

    For this year his stock award target has been cut to $40m, with three quarters of that dependant on share performance.

    The target for Mr Cook’s compensation for 2022 was $84m, although his actual total pay for last year was $99.4m. That figure included $630,600 in personal security costs and $712,500 for his use of a private jet.

    Last year Apple shareholders were urged by a leading investor advisory group to vote against Mr Cook’s pay package.

    In a letter to investors, Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) said there are “significant concerns” over the “design and magnitude” of the package.

    The ISS said Mr Cook’s pay was 1,447 times more than the wage of an average Apple employee.

    Mr Cook became Apple’s chief executive in August 2011, just weeks before the death of co-founder Steve Jobs.

    Under Mr Cook’s leadership Apple became the first company to reach a stock market valuation of $3tn before falling to about $2.1tn during a tumultuous year for the technology industry.

    Covid lockdowns at factories in China, supply chain delays and a global economic slowdown have helped push down Apple’s share price by more than 20% over the last year.

    The 62-year-old’s personal wealth stands at around $1.7bn, according to Forbes magazine. Mr Cook has pledged to give away his entire fortune during his lifetime.

    Source: BBC

  • Musk says Twitter misunderstanding with Apple CEO Tim Cook has been’resolved’

    Elon Musk has stated that he and Apple CEO Tim Cook have “resolved the misunderstanding” regarding Twitter’s possible removal from the app store.

    On Monday, Mr Musk accused Apple of threatening to remove the platform from its app store and announced that the company had halted the majority of its advertising on the site.

    However, the Twitter CEO stated on Wednesday, “Tim was clear that Apple never considered doing so.”

    He did not specify whether Apple’s advertising was discussed during the meeting.

    The meeting between the two tech titans comes as many businesses have stopped spending on Twitter due to concerns about Mr Musk’s content moderation plans for the site – a major setback for the company, which relies on such spending for the majority of its revenue.

    Entering a feud on Monday, Mr Musk accused Apple of “censorship” and criticised its policies, including the charge it levies on purchases made on its app store.

    “Apple has mostly stopped advertising on Twitter. Do they hate free speech in America?” he said.

    But he later told his followers he was meeting with Mr Cook at Apple’s headquarters, adding: “Good conversation. Among other things, we resolved the misunderstanding about Twitter potentially being removed from the App Store. Tim was clear that Apple never considered doing so.”

    The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites.View original tweet on Twitter

    News of the meeting with Apple came after Mr Musk was told he faced “huge work ahead” to bring Twitter into compliance with new European Union rules on disinformation or face a possible ban.

    EU commissioner Thierry Breton made the comments in a meeting with Mr Musk on Wednesday, saying the social media site would have to address issues such as content moderation, disinformation and targeted adverts.

    Approved by the EU earlier this year, the Digital Services Act is seen as the biggest overhaul of rules governing online activity in decades, imposing new obligations on companies to prevent abuse of their platforms.

    Major companies are expected to be in compliance with the law some time next year.

    If firms are found to be violation, they face fines of up to 6% of global turnover – or a ban in the case of repeated serious breaches.

    In a statement after the meeting, Mr Breton said he welcomed Mr Musk’s assurances that he would get Twitter ready to comply.

    “Let’s also be clear that there is still huge work ahead, as Twitter will have to implement transparent user policies, significantly reinforce content moderation and protect freedom of speech, tackle disinformation with resolve, and limit targeted advertising,” he said.

    “All of this requires sufficient AI [Artificial Intelligence] and human resources, both in volumes and skills. I look forward to progress in all these areas and we will come to assess Twitter’s readiness on site.”

    The EU plans to conduct a “stress test” in 2023 ahead of a wider audit, his office said.

    Since his $44bn takeover of Twitter last month, Mr Musk has fired thousands of staff, reinstated formerly banned users such as Donald Trump and stopped enforcing other policies, such as rules aimed at stopping misleading information on coronavirus.

    The moves have alarmed some civil rights groups, who have accused the billionaire of taking steps that will increase hate speech, misinformation and abuse.

    In a blog post on Wednesday, Twitter said none of its policies had changed, but that it was experimenting in an effort to improve the platform more quickly and would rely more on steps to limit the spread of material that violate its rules – offering “freedom of speech but not freedom of reach”.

    “Our trust & safety team continues its diligent work to keep the platform safe from hateful conduct, abusive behavior, and any violation of Twitter’s rules,” the company added.

    “The team remains strong and well-resourced, and automated detection plays an increasingly important role in eliminating abuse,” it said.

  • Tim Cook: ‘No good excuse’ for lack of women in tech

    Apple chief executive Tim Cook says there are still “not enough women at the table” at the world’s tech firms – including his own.

    In an exclusive interview with the BBC, Mr Cook said technology “will not achieve nearly what it could achieve” without a more diverse workforce.

    He said there were “no good excuses” for the lack of women in the sector.

    He also said he thought Augmented Reality (AR), and the concept of the Metaverse, were “profound.”

    “In the future people will wonder how we lived without AR,” he says. “We’re investing a tonne in that space.”

    Augmented Reality is a mixture of digital content and the real world – a very simple example might be using the phone on your camera to insert virtual furniture before you buy it, to see how it might look in your house.

    The metaverse is the concept of entire virtual worlds – and big tech is investing heavily in it, not least Meta, formerly Facebook, which re-branded itself to reflect its new priority.

    Meeting Tim Cook

    I met Tim Cook during his first visit to the UK since the pandemic.

    In person, the boss of the world’s richest company is affable, polite and thoughtful.

    He’s softly spoken, and was dressed in his trademark dark clothes. He wasn’t big on small talk, although we joked about the British weather, and he offered his condolences on the death of the Queen.

    Tim Cook and Zoe Kleinman

    Tim Cook and Zoe Kleinman

    Mr Cook told me he is “not a great role model” for work-life balance and that it isn’t a phrase he associates with himself.

    “There’s little distinction between personal and work, they blend,” he says.He adds that he tries to “compartmentalise” issues that are outside of his control. “I realise that they’re there… but I don’t obsess with it,” he says.

    He was fascinated by my BBC audio recorder and turned it over in his hands a few times once we had finished our interview.

    I confessed that I’d had to ask his colleagues if I could borrow some wired headphones to plug into it – Apple largely ditched the headphone socket from its iPhones in 2016, in favour of wireless in-ear AirPods.

    “Oh we still sell those,” he said seriously of the wired pair hanging from my ears. “People still buy them.”

    He was keen to talk to me about another subject close to his heart – diversity.

    ‘No good excuses’

    Apple has just launched its founders’ development programme for female founders and app creators in the UK.

    “I think the the essence of technology and its effect on humanity depends upon women being at the table,” Mr Cook says.

    “Technology’s a great thing that will accomplish many things, but unless you have diverse views at the table that are working on it, you don’t wind up with great solutions.”

    He said while companies including his own had made progress on diversity, there were “no good excuses” for the tech sector not to employ more women.

    Apple had 35% female staff in the US in 2021, according to its own diversity figures.

    It launched its original Apple Health Kit in 2014 without a period tracker – which led to accusations that this was an oversight due to male bias among its developers.

    Deloitte Global estimate large global technology firms will reach nearly 33% overall female representation in their workforces in 2022 on average – with 25% occupying technical roles.

    One challenge facing the sector is the lack of girls choosing to pursue science, tech, engineering and maths subjects at school.

    “Businesses can’t cop out and say ‘there’s not enough women taking computer science – therefore I can’t hire enough’,” says Mr Cook.

    “We have to fundamentally change the number of people that are taking computer science and programming.”

    His view is that everybody should be required to take some sort of coding course by the time they finish school, in order to have a “working knowledge” of how coding works and how apps are created.

    Apple has also created its own programme language, Swift, along with content for learning how to use it.

    Equalising the playing field

    Mr Cook and I also met a small group of female app founders, three of whom have joined Apple’s new programme.

    Apple's female founder programme

    App creators Alexia de Broglie, Sahar Fikouhi, Ariana Alexander-Sefre and Zoë Desmond. Alexia, Ariana and Zoë are all on Apple’s new UK programme for founders.

    One of those is Alexia de Broglie, who created a personal finance education app called Your Juno, for women and non-binary people, after being shocked by how little her female friends understood about finance.

    She said she belongs to some WhatsApp groups for founders, and that some of those are 90% male.

    “[The women] all know each other on a first-name basis, which is crazy, because there are so many men that are building start-ups, and they definitely don’t know each other.”

    Ariana Alexander-Sefre runs Spoke, a wellness app aimed at young people, which she created after her younger brother lost a friend to suicide.

    “I hope that in five years, that there’s not even going be a thing of female founder, or there’s not even going to be a defined niche because, you know, there will just be so many different people working on different things,” she says.

    “I’d love to see the whole playing field just equalised.”

    Souce: BBC